Page 105 of Goodbye Days

I wave. We head up to the balcony.

“Those two seemed nice.”

“Seemed. From the first second my sister brought them home from college, they’ve loved tormenting me. They think it’s hysterical.”

Jesmyn purses her lips and grabs my chin. “Oh, you poor widdle thing. Bwess your heart.”

I grin and pull my chin away. “Don’t you start.”

We find our seats in the balcony.

“Did you listen to that Dearly mix I made you?” Jesmyn asks.

“Of course.”

“And?”

“It was awesome.”

“I hear he’s way better live.”

I’ve never seen her this way. She’s gleaming. I can sense her heat on my face. She cranes her neck to try to look at the stage setup.

“Sorry,” she murmurs, still craning. “I’m geeking out over the keyboard gear.”

“It’s okay,” I say quite sincerely, because the way she’s positioned, I have an unobstructed view of the geography between her ear and her jaw. Suddenly, I want to kiss it so badly it makes me delirious.

But then Pierce appears on my shoulder—a cartoon demon—whispering: You don’t deserve this. This moment is not yours. She is not yours and never can be. And you can never be hers. You’re borrowing this for a few hours. Both of you belong to my dead son.

She snaps her head back to me, about to say something, but her expression changes when she sees me. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“You okay? You had this Carverish look.”

“Yeah…just thinking…of a story idea. About a musician.”

Jesmyn’s eyes dance. “I want to read it when you’re done.”

“Totally.”

She starts to say something else, but the lights dim for the opening act.

During their set, she turns to me and says something. I’m able to read her lips, but I pretend I can’t so that she’ll cup her hand to my ear and put her lips to it.

“These guys are great!” she yells.

I could respond with a nod, but I opt to cup my hand to Jesmyn’s ear and put my lips to it, to say, “Totally. They rock.”

They play for about forty-five minutes and leave the stage. Jesmyn and I chat about nothing in particular while roadies change over the equipment onstage.

While we talk, a familiar but also new confessional yearning seizes me: I want to tell her how I feel about her. The second this hunger starts blossoming in me, though, I see Pierce’s face. I see Adair’s face. I see Judge Edwards’s face. I see the faces of the detectives and assistant district attorney who questioned me. I see the officers turning over my room. I see Eli’s face. Here you are, man, using my ticket to go see a concert with my girlfriend after you sent the text that killed me. Why don’t you tell her you’re into her? Maybe you two can get together. After all, my dad didn’t say you couldn’t. He only said he didn’t want to see it.

Jesmyn looks at me. “You having fun?”

I hadn’t realized I was staring at her; my mind was so distant. “Oh…yeah. Definitely.”

“We’ll make a music lover of you yet.”